BROWN CREEPER (Certhia familiaris 

 americana and other Bubspecies). 



Length, 5^ inches. 



Range: Breeds from Nebraska, Indiana, 

 North Carolina (mountains), and Massachusetts 

 north to southern Canada, also in the mountains 

 of the western United States, north to Alaska, 

 south to Nicaragua; winters over most of its 

 range. 



Habits and economic status: Rarely indeed 

 is the creeper seen at rest. It appears to spend 

 its life in an incessant scramble over the trunks 

 and branches of trees, from which it gets all 

 its food. It is protectively colored so as to be 

 practically invisible to its enemies and, though 

 delicately built, possesses amazingly strong 

 claws and feet. Its tiny eyes are sharp enough 

 to detect insects so small that most other species 

 pass them by, and altogether the creeper fills 

 a unique place in the ranks of our insect 

 destroyers. The food consists of minute in- 

 sects and insects' eggs, also cocoons of tineid 

 moths, small wasps, ants, and bugs, especially 

 scales and plant lice, with some small cater- 

 pillars. As the creeper remains in the United 

 States throughout the year, it naturally secures hibernating insects and insects' 

 eggs, as well as spiders and spiders' eggs, that are missed by the summer birds. 

 On its bill of fare we find no product of husbandry nor any useful insects. 



HOUSE WREN (Troglodytes aedon). 



Length, 4| inches. The only one of our wrens with wholly whitish under- 



parts that lacks a light line over the eye. 

 Range: Breeds throughout the United States (except the South Atlantic and 



Gulf States) and southern Canada; winters in the southern United States and 



Mexico. 

 Habits and economic status: The rich, bubbling song of the familiar little 



house wren is one of the sweetest associations coimected with country and 



submrban life. Its tiny body, long bill, sharp eyes, and strong feet peculiarly 



adapt it for creeping into all sorts of nooks and 

 crannies where lurk the insects it feeds on. A 

 cavity in a fence post, a hole in a tree, or a 

 box will be welcomed alike by this busybody 

 as a nesting site; but since the advent of the 

 quarrelsome English sparrow such domiciles 

 are at a premium and the wren's eggs and 

 family are safe only in cavities having en- 

 trances too small to admit the sparrow. Hence 

 it behooves the farmer's boy to provide boxes 

 the entrances to which are about an inch in 

 diameter, nailing these under gables of bams 

 and outhouses or in orchard trees. In this 

 way the numbers of this useful bird can be 

 increased, greatly to the advantage of the 

 farmer. Grasshoppers, beetles, caterpillars, 

 bugs, and spiders are the principal elements of 

 its food. Cutworms, weevils, ticks, and plant 

 lice are among the injurious forms eaten. The 

 nestlings of house wrens consume great quan- 

 tities of insects. (See Yearbook U. S. Dept. 

 Agric. 1895, pp. 416-418, and Biol. Survey 

 Bui. 30, pp. 60-62.) 



676 



